Version 3.5.5 Released

February 19: Version 3.5.5 has been approved by Apple and should appear on your App Store soon. The update will be available on the App Store for existing users for a period of 2-3 weeks to allow most users time to upgrade. Please see the longer explanation of this process, and reasons behind it, in the article below.

This update is targeted at existing users of Equipd. It fixes a number of minor bugs. It also introduces a new feature for those who want to have greater control over their inline expanded notes.

Summary of changes in 3.5.5:

Limited support for HTML tags has been enabled for expanded inline notes. This provides more granular formatting options for those who want to learn how to use it - see subheading below.

Improved detection of "Alternate Presentation" options often found in the Workbooks, NWT appendices etc. Equipd will now try to use an offline version if possible.

HTML Tags in Expanded Notes

With the introduction of the new Christian Life & Ministry Workbooks and new talk formats, many users are using the expanded notes to insert their answers, talk notes or presentation comments directly in Equipd. Equipd now has limited support for a specific subset of HTML tags that can be inserted into the note, providing greater control over the formatting of the inline note. This feature is not exactly "user-friendly" but has been enabled to help those who are interested in learning how to type HTML into a note to format the output to their requirements.

These tags are manually typed into the note. Insertion of these tags must follow HTML guidelines. With the exception of the <br> tag, all tags require an opening tag (eg <strong>) and a closing tag (eg </strong>).

For example try typing the following into a note (make sure you have the "Expand Text?" option enabled):

Here is some <b>bold text</b>. And <i>italics</i>. And now I will force a new line.<br><br>There should be a blank line above this. And here is some <red>red text</red>.

You can read more about HTML tags and how to write them on w2schools.com. Remember that only the specific tags listed above will work in the note.

Tip: Typing HTML tags on the iOS keyboard can be a bit painful. In iOS Settings > General > Keyboard > "Text Replacement" you can create shortcuts to speed up the process. For example I created the shortcut ",red" which will autocomplete as <red> and ".red" to autocomplete as </red>.

Extremely Important

As before, in order to push out this update to existing users of Equipd I will need to make the app available on the App Store for a short period of time. It is essential that users upgrade promptly before the app is removed once again from the App Store. You will not be able to update to version 3.5.5 once I have removed the app again. This is to work around limitations with the App Store where it is not possible to update users who already have an app without the app being generally available.

As before, I will also be increasing the price of the app and posting a notice to discourage new users from trying to purchase the app. Any users who have downloaded the app since December 2014 will have done so at their own risk and should have read the notices on the App Store alerting them to the fact that this app is "end of life" and is only being updated at my discretion.

Hopefully existing users are happy with this effort to keep Equipd working for them, which has cost me hundreds of hours in ongoing development and support time.

Should users expect updates after this?

Users should not expect more updates.

This update is not about new users getting to download Equipd. It is just supporting the existing users who already had Equipd before I decided to remove it from the App Store in December last year. At that time I announced the demise of Equipd and that I would try to support it for as long as possible, but not forever. I have done my best to keep it going for existing users, knowing that many are so reliant on the app and that there is currently no official replacement for many of the features people use daily, especially those in the foreign language field.

However users should remind themselves of the initial announcement about the app being removed as the overall status has not changed. And please ensure you take a backup of this latest version (3.5.5) of Equipd, just in case you need to restore the app on your devices in the future.

If you have questions about how to backup the app for future use or how to install the app on new devices, this is covered here.